Welcome to the Alger County, Michigan GenWeb site!
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Alger is one of the modern counties to be organized in the Upper Peninsula, being set off from Schoolcraft in 1885. Munising, the county seat, a prosperous village of three thousand people, was originally a dense forest tract. This region was a favorite camping ground of the Ojibwa, and two miles from Old Munising is an ancient Indian cemetery in which, among other braves, is known to be buried Chief Nah-ben-ay-ash.
White settlers came in 1850, when the Munising Company, with Thomas Sparks, of Philadelphia, as president, became owners of a tract of land bordering on the bay. The property later came into possession of Peter White, of Marquette. In 1867 Mr. White built a large blast furnace for the manufacture of charcoal iron at Old Munising, and after being operated under his ownership for some time was sold to the Munising Iron Company, which failed in 1877.
Old Munising gradually declined until the building of the Munising railway in 1895 and the more recent establishment of the large tannery of the Munising Leather Company. These two events have caused a new town to spring up from the ruins of the old. By 1881 the population was about four hundred.
Timothy Nester is generally spoken of as the "father of New Munising." It was in the year 1894 that this progressive thinker arrived in Munising from Au Train. It was the end of the old for Alger County and beginning of the new.
Neighboring counties are Marquette,
Delta, Schoolcraft, and Luce.
Contact Us
County Coordinator: Up for Adoption
Contact the State Coordinator: Wayne Summers.
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Last update: Tuesday, 04-Nov-2025 14:54:31 MST
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